Which to use
“pooled” and “posed” are a confusable English pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.
- #29,792
- “pooled” frequency rank
- #9,510
- “posed” frequency rank
- 39302
- confusion score
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Feature | pooled | posed |
|---|---|---|
| Definition | simple past and past participle of pool | simple past and past participle of pose |
Where the eye mixes pooled and posed
Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence.
Why the eye confuses pooled with posed
A purely visual mix-up. pooled (/puːld/) and posed (/pəʊzd/) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by 1 letter(s) in length. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 39302, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.
pooled is recorded at frequency rank #29,792, classified as averb, pronounced /puːld/. posed is at rank #9,510, tagged as averb, pronounced /pəʊzd/.
Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.
With a confusion score of 39302, this pair ranks #277,932 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs - roughly mid-pack for confusability.
Orthographic DNA of pooled vs posed
Shared letters: deop. Private to "pooled": l. Private to "posed": s.
"pooled" · 6 letters · shape CVVCVC · "posed" · 5 letters · shape CVCVC
Known mistypes of this pair
Frequently Asked Questions
Is swapping "pooled" for "posed" ever safe?
Frequency check: "pooled" vs "posed" - which ranks higher?
What to do next
Eye-level mix-up between "pooled" and "posed" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.
- Full dictionary entry for "pooled" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
- Full dictionary entry for "posed" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
- This pair ranks #277,932 of 530,003 scored English confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
- "pooled" and "posed" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "pooled vs pooper". Nearby pair
- Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes
Confusion rank #277,932 of 530,003 scored English pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.